On the eve of the New Year, here is another tennis post. Here are my predictions for 2020. This could be, and probably will be, way wrong; but it will be fun to look back at the end of the year and see if I got anything right.
Australian Open
The 2019 winners: Naomi Osaka is one of the three top young stars that emerged in 2018/2019, the other two being Ashleigh Barty and Bianca Andreescu. However, she seemed to find it mentally difficult to defend her 2018 titles in Indian Wells and the US Open. For that reason, I won’t predict her to repeat here. Petra Kvitova came close to winning in 2019, but at this point I am not sure that she still is capable of producing the consistent top quality play needed to win a Slam title.
My prediction: This will be the time Karolina Pliskova finally gets that elusive Slam title. She has been a top player for many years and produced one of her best seasons in 2019, finishing at #2 in the world. Last year, she got to the semifinals, losing to Osaka. This will be the time she goes all the way.
French Open
The 2019 winners: Ashleigh Barty was a surprise winner on clay, but I don’t think it should be that surprising that she would do well on the surface. Still, she didn’t face a top-10 player on her way to the title. Marketa Vondrousova got demolished in the final, which caused some people to discount her future chances to win a Slam; but I think her first Finals appearance (as a teenager) can be excused. Not everyone can be as poised as Bianca Andreescu in their first final. For the previous three months, Vondrousova had beaten nearly everyone she should beat and then some (such as Simona Halep, at both Indian Wells and the Italian Open). So I think she could be a contender. But it remains to be seen how she’ll return from her wrist injury, so I won’t predict her to win it yet.
My prediction: This is a boring pick, but Simona Halep is still the best clay player. She’s my pick to win it in 2020.
Wimbledon
The 2019 winners: Simona Halep certainly proved she can win on more surfaces than just clay. Still, clay is her best surface, and grass probably her worst, so I don’t expect her to repeat. Grass is probably Serena Williams’s best surface, and either this or the US Open (due to the crowd support) probably will be her best chance at a GS title in 2020. But I wonder if she can get through two weeks of a Slam against the best competition anymore. She will be another year older. So I will not predict her to win it either.
My prediction: Grass could be Barty’s best surface. In 2018, she won the International-level tournament on the grass in Nottingham. This year, she won in Birmingham, a Premier title, in her first tournament after winning the French Open. I’ll predict that Barty will win here on the grass at Wimbledon, for her second slam title.
US Open
2019 winners: Perhaps it is wrong to predict no Slams for Bianca Andreescu in 2020. I don’t think she’ll have a bad season; I think she’ll be in the top 10 all year. But the tennis world will study her game and make adjustments, and it remains to be seen how that will affect her. She lost to Osaka and Halep toward the end of the year, proving that she is not, in fact, invincible. Probably some players whom she faced this year will figure out how to beat her in a re-match. Serena Williams will have the crowd’s support, but she hasn’t won at the US Open since 2014, and I am increasingly leaning toward the opinion that she won’t get that elusive 24th Slam.
My prediction: Naomi Osaka has won here in the past, and so far her best surface has been hard courts. In both of the last two seasons she has done well late in the year. In 2019, while she struggled in the middle of the schedule, she rebounded towards the end of the season – in fact, she hasn’t lost since the US Open, winning in both Japan and China, and withdrawing from the WTA Finals after beating Kvitova. She won’t be defending a title here, so perhaps her late-season run will begin at the US Open and she’ll get her third Slam title.
Top 10:
- Osaka
- Barty
- Pliskova
- Halep
- Bencic
- Kenin
- Svitolina
- Andreescu
- Vondrousova
- Anisimova